I have been up to the BWCA 10-15 times but now desire to do a 4-5 day solo with my Winonah Odyssey 18 (fiberglass - 60#) in September. I would like to live on smallies or whatever native fish grow up there. Any suggestions for a 66 year old seasoned trekker?

Don't take your 18 foot tandem. Rent or borrow a smaller boat. Any little breeze is going to have you struggling to get where you wish to go.

I agree with sedges - unless you are a giant human being and/or carrying a huge load, that's a lot of boat for one person and will be a problem in any wind. Almost any tandem will be tough for a normally-sized solo paddler, but an 18 footer especially so.

since you asked for suggestions i'll throw out a few.

1. start at gunflint lake and paddle to little gun, little north, north, south lake 58 (actual entry to bwca), rat, rose, stairway portage to duncan, exit west bearskin.
more paddling than portaging, although i am guessing you will be double portaging.
you could get your permit for your second day of travel allowing you to camp on the east end of gunflint or north lake your first night, then enter the bwca the next day crossing the portage (height of land ((although no real height to speak of)) into south lake. the only portage with real elevation change is the stairway portage which is about 105 steps going uphill and downhill on your way back :). this route is known for smallies. it is a border route so you would need to fish and camp only on american side.
you could rent a solo from gunflint outfitters on gunflint lake and arrange to call for a pickup from west bearskin lake at the end of your trip.

2. start by getting a ride to entry for larch creek 80, maneuver through the creek which eventually widens into larch lake. there are a few beaver dams on the creek you'll need to carry over, probably need to unload the canoe. there are some sites on larch lake. portage into clove lake and there are a few sites on this lake. you could continue on and do the entire granite river route with more portages but then you'll need to tackle Saganaga lake at the end (and best to do it EARLY morning) where you could call for a pickup.
OR from clove lake you could make your way back to gunflint lake using a few portages, the longest is 105 rd, you will also portage around little rock falls (on the canadian side) and then one more short rocky portage into magnetic lake and you have nothing but paddling for about 3 miles back to the beach at gunflint lake. if you use gunflint outfitters then you can park there, get a ride for a fee and then end your trip there.

3.. if you are looking for a relaxing basecamp type trip you could use a 66 crocodile river permit. you would launch at the east bearskin lake landing and paddle about a mile or two to the portage, somewhat uphill but a decent portage, to crocodile. there are 4 sites on the lake, the nicest being more toward the east end of the lake. it's a quiet lake, only one permit per day. you could try to make your way through the river to the vegetable lakes. i've caught nice bass in that lake plus there are walleyes and northerns, too.

these are just suggestions. if you could share how much you plan to paddle or basecamp that would be helpful.

Tip #1 - post this in the Solo Tripping forum, one of the add-on forums to the general list

Tip #2 - don't count on living on smallies, bring some sort of backup food with you, even if it's the dehydrated stuff

Tip #3 - plan for extra time to set up camp than your normal trips with others along, then double it

Tip #4 - gets dark pretty early in September, bring something along to entertain yourself from sunset to bed time

JD

Thanks for the input! I will say that I have had the Odyssey for 20 years, am relatively strong and have shouldered this canoe on many group trips. I recently added a middle seat/portage yolk combo and am having pretty good success canoeing solo on local lakes. I can almost guarantee I will be double portaging but hey, I'm 66 and am in no hurry! I also place a 5 gallon pail of water in the bow to trim it out - a sack of rocks would do too. But I am also considering leaving 'Odie' home in favour of a solo model - just this once!

Thanks for the great info! I am leaning more toward #3, EP 66 for Croc. River. Please clarification on the 'one permit per day' comment - does this mean you can only spend one night at the camp site? I would like to spend at least 3 nights at one camp site - just relax, catch some fish etc. for my first solo, maybe strike out for more adventurous treks with greater confidence. Again thanks for your great response!

Thanks you sir!

I just got back from a 4 day trip into a new area for me that has me thinking about doing a solo trip. Went in Lizz lake off of Poplar and down through Caribou and Horseshoe and into Gaskin. Plan had been to complete a loop by working North from Gaskin through Hensen and a couple of other small lakes to Meeds but we adjusted due to strong winds and came back through Jump and Allen lakes back to Caribou.

I'm intrigued by this area as there are lots of options to easily lengthen or shorten a planned loop and we had decent fishing, catching a couple of Walleyes on Horseshoe and then enough smallies on Gaskin to provide a couple of meals without trying too hard.